Matt Reeves to direct The Passage

More vampires for the man at the helm of Cloverfield and Let Me In, as he has just signed on to direct a film adaptation of Justin Cronin’s novel The Passage. More after the break.

Scott Free is producing the film; Ridley Scott was originally going to be at the head of this project, but, obviously, isn’t anymore.

Deadline, who broke the news, provided a description of the source material:

In The Passage, a group of terminally ill cancer patients get healthy after being subjected to the bites of bats in South America. Naturally, the government see this as a cure for the disease and starts experimenting. They end up with a legion of nearly indestructible, telepathic vampire masters that begin infecting the populace. The tone is closer to 28 Days Later and The Stand than Let The Right One In or Twilight Saga.

Matt Reeves is going to oversee a new rewrite of the screenplay, which was originally written by John Logan while Scott was attached to the project (Logan is working on the new Bond movie at the moment).

Earlier this week, Reeves also signed a deal to write and direct an adaptation of Ray Nelson’s short story 8 O’Clock in the Morning, which was previously turned into a film by John Carpenter in 1988, in the form of They Live.

I haven’t seen Let Me In. Whether it’s a good film or not, it still annoys me that it was decided to make a new American adaptation of John Ajvide Lindqvist’s book, instead of give 2008’s brilliant Let the Right One In a bigger promotion push all over town, or somethin’. Nonetheless, I am a huge fan of Cloverfield, The Passage sounds great (enough so that I might seek it out), and I am looking forward to seeing what Reeves does with it.